Artist of the Month

Artist of the month – July 2026

Anthony Eyton

Anthony Eyton studied fine art at Reading University in 1941 before serving in the Army from 1942 to 1947. He went on to study at Camberwell School of Art from 1947 to 1950, and in 1951 received an Abbey Major Scholarship, taking him to work in Italy. Eyton was Head of Painting at St Lawrence College, Kingston, Ontario in 1969 and taught at the Royal Academy Schools from 1964 to 1999.

Eyton has had solo exhibitions at the New Art Centre, London from 1959, the New Grafton Gallery, London (1973), Newcastle-upon-Tyne Polytechnic Gallery (1978) and at the Imperial War Museum, London (1983). A retrospective of his work was held at the South London Art Gallery in 1980 and subsequently toured. He has exhibited regularly in solo exhibitions at Browse & Darby, London since 1980, most recently in 2013. Eyton’s work has also been included in many key group exhibitions, including Drawings of People at the Serpentine Gallery (1976), British Painting 1952 to 1977 at the RA (1977), the Arts Council’s British Art Show (1979), the Hayward Annual (1982) and The Hard Won Image, at the Tate Gallery (1984).

Eyton has travelled extensively, particularly to India, Israel and Sudan. In 1982 he was commissioned by the Artistic Records Committee to observe and paint the Gurkha regiment in Hong Kong and the New Territories, the paintings of which were exhibited at the Imperial War Museum. In 1985 he was Resident Artist at the Leicester Royal Infirmary, with subsequent exhibitions held at the hospital, Surrey University and the King’s Fund Centre. In 1996, the Government Art Collection commissioned him to record the centenary of the British Embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He was also invited by the Tate Gallery to work in the Bankside Power Station prior to it becoming Tate Modern, and two pictures subsequently entered the Tate Collection. Since 1999 he has been Resident Artist at the Eden Project in Cornwall.

Among Eyton’s many awards are the Kingston Whig-Standard Award, Ontario (1969), John Moores Prize Winner (1972), Grocers’ Company Fellowship to work in Italy (1973), First Prize at the Second British International Drawing Biennale, Middlesbrough (1975) and Charles Wollaston Award (Royal Academy, 1989). Eyton was elected a Member of the London Group in 1958, Member of the Royal West of England Academy in 1984, Royal Academician in 1986 (ARA 1976), Member of the Royal Watercolour Society in 1988 and a Member of the Royal Cambrian Academy in 1993.

In June 2023 he was awarded an OBE in the King’s Birthday Honours for services to painting and to the art community.

 

Artist of the Month: June 2026

Maude Lewis

Maud Lewis exemplified the simple life. But simple doesn’t mean dull. The simplicity of her paintings, brushed initially with scrounged paint from local fishermen onto ubiquitous green boards and post cards, continue to evoke feelings of innocence, of child-like exuberance as enduring as the spring times she loved to paint. And today she still captures audiences intrigued by everyday scenes as diverse as hard-working oxen and whimsical butterflies.

Maud Dowley Lewis was born March 7, 1903 in South Ohio, a community near Yarmouth. Her father Jack would provide a moderately prosperous living as a respected craftsman, making harnesses and serving as a blacksmith. Agnes, her mother, favoured artistic pursuits including painting, folk carving and music. Born disfigured with sloped shoulders and her chin resting on her chest, Maud led a confined but happy home life after she quit school at 14, perhaps in part to escape the mocking of her peers. “What is life without love or friendship?” she once confided to a friend. Her mother lovingly taught her to play the piano before arthritis crippled her hands. Physical deformity may have been her lot, but even more tragic was the loss of both her parents within two years. Who would care for Maud? Thankfully, an aunt who lived in Digby took her in. There she would later answer a newspaper ad that would determine the course of her life. A man named Everett Lewis wanted a housekeeper for his cottage in Marshalltown. She married him in 1938 at the age of thirty-four and would never travel more than an hour’s drive from her birthplace. “I ain’t much for traveling anyway,” she said later, “as long as I have a brush in front of me, I’m all right.” Cameo cigarettes added their share of comfort as well.

Although short in stature with hands gnarled by arthritis as the years passed, she stood tall when she plied her brush over green-backed particle board. Everett Lewis, a stingy, parsimonious but certainly hard-working man, kept house and made meals allowing Maud to spend most of her time delving into her world of wonder and creating fanciful works of art. Maud gathered images from her happy childhood and limited excursions in a Model T with Everett to paint cheerful images on dust pans, scallop shells and even on her house. They would settle into a routine where Everett enjoyed peddling and haggling over the paintings Maud would love to paint. The happiness she painted first attracted neighbours, then tourists and eventually even international attention. It started with a Star Weekly newspaper article and then a 1965 CBC Telescope program featuring her unique works. Her notoriety began to bloom like the cherry trees that garnished several of her paintings. Orders came in so fast that the paint hardly had time to dry–one reason you may notice fingerprints on some edges of her paintings.

Her style became as fanciful as her subjects. She painted a world often without shadows, autumn leaves on winter landscapes, and even 3-legged oxen. Was she adding humour in her subtle, shy way? Her gentle nature and magnetic smile might give that away. Awkwardly bent over a painting, she may have been squinting and intense, but her inner joy escaped onto her panels with unriveled determination and vitality. Small wonder her work garnered the attention of even the Nixon White House. Ever pragmatic, Maud wrote to ask that funds be forwarded before she sent the requested two panels to the President! Today her work unequivocally demands status as “important art” in numerous fine-art collections around the world.

Much like her American counterpart, Anna Marie Robertson (Grandma Moses), Maud was uniquely creative, self-taught, specialised in painting everyday rural life, loved animals and appreciated the beauty of nature. Both initially sold their paintings for just a few dollars, but saw their work increase dramatically over the years. The works of Grandma Moses command prices in the $30,000 to $600,000 range. Of comparable quality, Maud’s paintings currently fetch $6,000 to $20,000, holding much promise for the future.

Not formally trained, Maud adopted a style that emerged from inside the heart of a true artist. As such, she could produce images of enduring quality and appeal, images that transformed her maritime surroundings into painted visions. The irresistible charm of her art had triumphed over the arrows of adversity.

 

Artist of the month May 2026

George Clausen

George Clausen absorbed a range of Continental influences to become a significant plein-air artist of scenes of rural life in oil, watercolour and pastel. The striking, sometime stark naturalism that he learned from Bastien-Lepage and Millet gave way to a light-filled, atmospheric Impressionism. While promoting new developments in painting as a leading member of the New English Art Club, he was eventually accepted by more established societies of artists, including the Royal Academy, becoming a notable Professor of Painting at the Royal Academy Schools. In addition to his distinctive landscapes – both with and without figures – he essayed portraits, nudes, interiors and still life compositions, and produced occasional, but significant murals, one of which was recognised with a knighthood.

George Clausen was born at 8 William Street, Regent’s Park, London, on 18 April 1852, the second of five children of the Danish decorative painter, Jurgen (George) Johnson Clausen, and his wife, Elizabeth (née Fillan).

On leaving St Mark’s School, King’s Road, Chelsea, in 1867, Clausen became an apprentice in the drawing office of Messrs 176 Trollope & Sons, a leading firm of decorators. While there, he also took drawing lessons with John Leghorn, which prepared him for a course of evening classes, on a two-year scholarship, at the National Art Training School, South Kensington. During his time there, he won two of its gold medals for design (in 1868 and 1870). By 1871, he had moved with his family to 9 Stafford Terrace, Fulham Road.

As the result of a commission to decorate the house of the history painter, Edwin Long, Clausen became the artist’s researcher, and received assistance from him in his development as an artist. Taking Long’s advice, Clausen visited Belgium and Holland during the years 1875-76. He studied briefly at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp under Joseph Van Lerius and, absorbing the influence of painters of the Hague School, began to take an interest in working en plein air. The results included High Mass at a Fishing Village on the Zuider Zee (Nottingham Castle Museum), which he showed successfully as his first exhibit at the Royal Academy of Arts in 1876. In the same year, he was elected an associate of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours (becoming a full member in 1879).

Believing that he could learn more from a formal art education, Clausen went to Paris in 1876, in the hope of entering the atelier of Jean-Léon Gérôme, but found it closed. He then considered working under Carolus-Duran, only to be shocked by ‘sloppy paint and bitumen all over the place’, and so returned to London. There he learned not only from the successful genre works of William Quiller Orchardson, Marcus Stone and James Tissot, but also from the experiments of James McNeill Whistler. By the end of the 1870s, he and his family were living at 4 The Mall, Park Road, Haverstock Hill, and he was establishing himself in his own studio.

In 1881, Clausen married fellow artist, Agnes Webster, in Kings Lynn, and they settled first in the village of Childwick Green, near St Albans, Hertfordshire, moving to Grove House, Fag End Road, Cookham Dean, Berkshire, in 1885. They would have three sons and two daughters; Margaret would marry the artist, Thomas Derrick, while Katharine would herself become an artist.

Clausen’s move to the country marked his increasing focus on rural themes, interpreted through a broad technique that involved the use of square-headed brushes. He was influenced in this approach by developments in France, which he visited on painting trips, including that to Brittany in 1882, and for further study, spending a term at the Académie Julian under Bouguereau and Robert-Fleury in 1883 (the year that he was elected to the new Institute of Painters in Oil Colours). He was especially inspired by the example of Jules Bastien-Lepage, whose work he had first seen at the Grosvenor Gallery, and would do much to promote him in England, as exemplified by the article, ‘Bastien-Lepage and Modern Realism’, published in The Scottish Art Review in 1888. He also had his own French success, when he was awarded a silver medal at the Exposition universelle, in Paris, in 1889.

In 1884, critics had attacked the harsh realism of Clausen’s painting, Labourers after Dinner (private collection), when it was shown at the Royal Academy. This encouraged him to help found the New English Art Club in 1886, and he – like his friend and fellow member, Henry La Thangue – would remain a keen advocate of the reform of the Royal Academy after he returned to exhibiting there regularly in 1891. In that year, he and his family moved to Bishops Farm House, Widdington, near Newport, Essex, and many of the local farmyards, barns and fields would feature his work.

Attracted to a range of modern painting, Clausen tempered his monumental depictions of the agricultural labourer, influenced by Jean-François Millet, with an increasingly bright palette, derived from the Impressionists, and an atmospheric use of pastel, inspired by Edgar Degas. However, he strengthened his association with more established institutions, and was elected to the Royal Society of Painters in Water-Colours (ARWS 1889; RWS 1898) and the Royal Academy (ARA 1895; RA 1908). His standing at home was confirmed by a series of solo shows – the first of which was held at the Goupil Gallery, London, in 1902 – while his wider reputation was consolidated through the award of medals at a number of international exhibitions, notably those in Chicago (1893), Brussels (1897) and Paris (1900). He also visited Hungary in 1894 and Italy in both 1898 and 1903.

Having taught at the Royal Academy Schools since the mid 1890s, Clausen became its Professor of Painting during the years 1903-6 (and would become temporary Director and Master of the Painting School in 1926-27). This academic position gave him the opportunity to urge the traditional study of the Old Masters in lectures that were published as Six Lectures on Painting (1904) and Aims and Ideals in Art (1906). From 1905, he maintained a London home and studio at 61 Carlton Hill, St John’s Wood. In 1909, he was master of the Art Workers’ Guild.

Clausen’s own work, exhibited in solo shows at the Leicester Galleries (1909 and 1912), demonstrated how tradition and innovation could complement each other, and it seemed no contradiction for an exponent of Impressionism to undertake public commissions. He was an original member of the Faculty of Painting for the British School at Rome (1912), an official war artist during the First World War (assigned to Woolwich Arsenal) and later a mural decorator of, especially, St Stephen’s Hall, Westminster (1927). The last of those projects led to his being knighted (1927) in a period in which he continued to be elected to exhibiting societies. He became an honorary member of the Royal Society of British Artists (1923) and a member of the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Water-Colours (1926). Retrospectives of his work were held at Barbizon House in 1928 and 1933. In these later years, he painted numerous landscapes around the Essex village of Duton Hill, where, from 1917, he maintained ‘Hillside’ cottage. Following the outbreak of the Second World War, he and Lady Clausen left their London home to live with their daughter, Margaret, and her husband, Thomas Derrick, at St Finians Farm, Cold Ash, Thatcham          near Newbury, Berkshire. He died there on 22 November 1944, eight months after his wife.

Artist of the month April 2026

Anna Ancher

1859 to 1935

Anna Ancher was the only member of the Skagen Painters, an artists’ colony on the Jutland peninsula in Denmark, to be born in the town of Skagen. Her parents, Erik and Ane Brøndum, owned the remote town’s only inn. From an early age, Ancher was exposed to visiting artists’ artwork and discussions.

As a woman, Ancher was not allowed to enroll at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen. Beginning in 1875, however, Ancher attended a private art school in Copenhagen run by Danish artist Vilhelm Kyhn. She returned to train with Kyhn for three subsequent winters. She also learned from painters who visited Skagen, including Karl Madsen and Michael Ancher, her future husband. Unusual for her time—thanks to her family’s support and the eased finances that accompanied Michael’s and Anna’s professional successes—Ancher continued painting even after the birth of the couple’s daughter, Helga, in 1883.

Ancher was part of the “Modern Breakthrough,” a Scandinavian movement in art and literature that, like French Naturalism and Realism, rejected idealization, and instead sought to capture the “real.” Ancher, especially, sought to capture the fleeting effects of light on her canvases, demonstrating the influence of Impressionist works she saw during trips to Paris in 1885 and 1888. She painted primarily small-scale interior scenes, reminiscent of Johannes Vermeer and Jean-Baptiste-Simeon Chardin.

 

Artist of the month March 2026

Beryl Cook

Beryl Francis Lansley was born in Egham, Surrey in 1926, one of four sisters. Her parents, Adrian S. B. Lansley and Ella Farmer-Francis, separated very early and her mother moved to Reading, Berkshire with her daughters. Beryl attended Kendrick School there, but left education at fourteen and started to work in a variety of jobs.[9] Having moved to London towards the end of the Second World War, Beryl tried working as a model and showgirl. In 1948 she married her childhood friend John Cook, who was in the merchant navy. When he retired from seafaring, they briefly ran a pub in Stoke-by-Nayland, Suffolk. Their son John was born in 1950,[10] and in 1956, the family left to live in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). They remained in Africa for the next decade, where in 1960 Cook produced her first painting, Hangover.[11]
The family returned to England in the mid-1960s, and in 1965 moved to East Looe, Cornwall, where Beryl focused more on her painting. They moved to Plymouth in 1968, where they bought a guest house on the Hoe. Cook divided her time between running the guest house and painting. In the mid-1970s, her works caught the attention of one of their guests, who put her in touch with the management of Plymouth Arts Centre, where her first exhibition took place in November 1975. The show was a great success and resulted in a magazine cover feature in The Sunday Times. This was followed by a 1976 exhibition at the Portal Gallery in London, where Cook continued to exhibit regularly until her death.
She soon became, in the estimation of Julian Spalding, the most genuinely popular living artist in Britain.[12]
Her first book of collected works was published by John Murray in 1978, and in 1979 a film was made for LWT’s The South Bank Show in which she discussed her work with Melvyn Bragg. Cook collaborated with such authors as Edward Lucie-Smith and Nanette Newman, providing illustrations for their books. Until the early 2000s, she regularly published books of her own art, such as Beryl Cook’s New York (1985) which had been inspired by her three-week visit to New York City in 1983.[13]
In 1994, she received the Best-Selling Published Artist Award from the Fine Art Trade Guild. In 1995 she was awarded the Order of the British Empire. She did not attend the official ceremony, due to her shyness, accepting the honour at a quieter ceremony in Plymouth the following year. The Royal Mail reproduced one of her paintings as a first-class postage stamp. In 2002, her painting The Royal Couple featured in the Golden Jubilee exhibition in London. Tiger Aspect Productions made two animated films called Bosom Pals using characters from her paintings, voiced by Dawn French, Rosemary Leach, Alison Steadman and Timothy Spall; they were broadcast in February 2004. Channel 4 News produced a short film on Beryl and her work in 2005, and she was also the featured artist in and episode of BBC Two’s The Culture Show in 2006.
Beryl Cook died on 28 May 2008 at home in Plymouth. Peninsula Arts of the Plymouth University mounted a major retrospective exhibition in November that year. Two books devoted to her were published: Beryl Cook 1926-2008 and The World of Beryl Cook. In 2010, two of her paintings were used as part of the Rude Britannia exhibition at the Tate Britain. Her paintings have been acquired by the Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow, Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery, Plymouth Art Gallery and Durham Museum.

Artist of the Month – February 2026

Anselm Kiefer

Anselm Kiefer (born 8 March 1945) is a German painter and sculptor. He studied with Peter Dreher and Horst Antes at the end of the 1960s. His works incorporate materials such as straw, ash, clay, lead, and shellac. The poems of Paul Celan have played a role in developing Kiefer’s themes of German history and the horrors of the Holocaust, as have the spiritual concepts of Kabbalah.

In his entire body of work, Kiefer argues with the past and addresses taboo and controversial issues from recent history. Themes from Nazi rule are particularly reflected in his work; for instance, the painting Margarete (oil and straw on canvas) was inspired by Celan’s well-known poem “Todesfuge” (“Death Fugue”).

His works are characterised by an unflinching willingness to confront his culture’s dark past, and unrealised potential, in works that are often done on a large, confrontational scale well suited to the subjects. It is also characteristic of his work to find signatures and names of people of historical importance, legendary figures or historical places. All of these are encoded sigils through which Kiefer seeks to process the past; this has resulted in his work being linked with the movements New Symbolism and Neo–Expressionism.

Kiefer has lived and worked in France since 1992. Since 2008, he has lived and worked primarily in Paris. In 2018, he was awarded Austrian citizenship.

 

Artist of the Month – January 2026

 Michael Reardon.

Michael Reardon has been painting in watercolor for over thirty years. An avid traveler, he uses watercolor to record his observations, convey a sense of place and light, and communicate his impressions of the built, natural, and imagined worlds. He works from his studio in Oakland, California.

In 2005 he was the recipient of the prestigious Gabriel Prize from the Western European Architecture Foundation, which enabled him to spend three months painting in Paris. Originally trained as an architect with a degree in architecture from UC Berkeley, he was an architectural illustrator for over thirty years.  In 2004 he was awarded the Hugh Ferriss Memorial Prize, the premier award in the field of architectural illustration.

His watercolors have been exhibited nationally and internationally, including the annual shows of the National Watercolor Society, the American Watercolor Society, and the California Art Club. In 2011 he presented a solo show at the Thomas Reynolds Gallery in San Francisco.

He is a signature member of the American Watercolor Society, the National Watercolor Society, Watercolor West, and the California Watercolor Association. He is also the author of Watercolor Techniques: Painting Light and Color in Landscapes and Cityscapes from North Light Books.